Consistent characters are the difference between a film and a slideshow. Generative models have no memory between calls; every scene starts from nothing, so a character described only in words comes out different every time. Story to film handles this with cast sheets: one reference image per character, drawn in your style before any scene exists, and used as the visual anchor for every scene that character appears in.

Who gets a sheet

The director puts the speaking and recurring characters into the cast, up to five. Crowds and passers-by are described inside the scene prompt instead; they do not need to be recognisable from one scene to the next. Each cast member is one being; two characters are never merged into a single sheet. That rule exists because a sheet showing "the frog and the owl" cannot anchor a frog and an owl separately, and every later stage would inherit the merge.

If your story has more than five recurring characters, the director keeps the ones who speak or carry the plot and describes the rest in the prompts. You can check the choice on the Ready screen and, if a character who matters was left out, add it in Characters and attach it to the scenes that need it.

What a sheet contains

A full-body front view on a plain background, with a written look: species or age, face, hair, costume, colours and one distinguishing mark. The image pins down what a description leaves open (ear shape, the cut of a jacket); the written look fixes what an image cannot (name, role) and steers the model even when the visual reference is weak. The written look travels into every scene prompt, so even a scene that fails to read the image still describes the right character.

Plain background and neutral pose are deliberate. The sheet is a specification, not a poster: dramatic lighting on the sheet drags that lighting into every scene that references it.

How scenes use the sheets

For every scene with a cast member the studio first renders a keyframe from the sheets and the scene prompt, with the instruction to keep each design faithful to its reference, then animates that keyframe. Image-to-video keeps identity far better than text-to-video, which is why this path is used at every quality tier, including Cinema. Scenes without a cast member, such as establishing shots, are generated from the prompt alone.

The keyframe is stored in the Library next to the clip, so you can inspect it. If a character looks wrong in a scene, look at the keyframe first: if the keyframe is wrong, the fix is the prompt or the sheet; if the keyframe is right and the clip drifts, regenerate the clip.

Non-human characters

A firefly is drawn as a firefly, a star child as a star child. The director's look for a non-human character states the species first, and the sheet is drawn from it in your style. This is the main reason a story with animals or objects as characters belongs in Story to film rather than in Inkmation, whose library only contains stylised people.

Fixing a character

  • Open Characters in the sidebar; the film's cast is saved there with its sheet and written look.
  • Add another reference image (a regenerated sheet, a different angle, a close-up of the face) or replace the master. Keep additions in the same style as the film.
  • Back in the film, regenerate the scenes that use the character. Only those scenes are charged; the rest of the film is re-edited around them.

Fix the sheet before fixing scenes. If a character is wrong in several scenes, the fault is almost always in the anchor, and regenerating scenes against a wrong sheet wastes clips.

Reusing a cast

Characters are yours after the film. Attach them to scenes in any other film, including screenplays you write yourself in Flow Studio, or build a Character Bible for a long-running series. A bible holds up to four reference faces, a default wardrobe and props, the voice used for lines and lip sync, and pose variants; it is the most expensive single operation in the studio, so build it once for a character you will use across many films and reuse it.

Frequently asked

How many characters can a film have? Up to five cast members with sheets. Other people in the story are described inside the scene prompts.

Can I use a photo of a real person as a sheet? Only for Cinematic realism and only with that person's consent. In drawn styles a photo pulls realism into every scene; generate the sheet in the film's style instead.

Why do two characters blend in one scene? Three or more cast members in one frame is where models start to mix features. Name their positions in the prompt ("the fox on the left") or split the moment into two scenes.

Do I pay again to reuse a character? No. The sheet is stored with the character; a new film that uses it skips that sheet slot.